The Waves

The groundbreaking experimental novel that follows six friends from childhood to old age from the author of To the Lighthouse, Orlando, and Mrs. Dalloway.

Originally published in 1931, The Waves gives readers an intimate look into the minds of six characters as they play together as children, go off to school, marry (or not), and enter their later years. Switching seamlessly from one person’s observations to another, the poetic prose forms portraits of the earthy Susan, the solitary Rhoda, the observant Bernard, the outsider Louis, the hedonistic Jinny, and the sensitive Neville. Together and apart, they come of age, facing grief and loss, complacency and responsibility; their minds a cacophony of insecurity, pride, jealousy, and love. One by one, their perspectives capture the shifting sands of life, as they tumble upon its shores to the inevitable end. 

“Poetic brilliance . . . Certainly it has seductive form (how smoothly, for example, the time-sense operates in carrying these people through life); certainly it contains much distinguished and beautiful writing; certainly it reveals exquisite sensibility.” —The New York Times